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Its certainly been a while since I did 'advertising-grade' work whose amount of brief changes rivals that of theme parks and events... This series (which you will come to see over the following months as part of a ongoing reveal), took a few months to put together. And for me that is one hell of a long time to be 'attached' on a project, one where I play a larger role of illustrator than designer. In my book that is the equivalent of a personal hell, but one that I look back at with pride when I see how far we came from the original brief or the balancing of "IP lore-hound" requirements which I think I needn't have to explain...

In no small way this was thanks to the support and prowess of art director Ghislain Barbe, who pretty much guided me and afforded a wide enough creative berth through it all, at times more of a collaborator than an art director (in the conventional sense). I'll say that I have never been more certain of not wanting his job , and that he has my deepest respect given the creative challenges we had to go through.

The main point I am trying to make, as a kind of "outsider" contractor to this production, is that to all the 40K fans out there, know that you have a team there that is truly committed to delivering what you have loved and will continue to love for a long time to come.

See you on the battlefields Ave Dominus Nox!

PS: It was really weird to paint a character I was led to hate thanks to Aaron Dembski Bowden's Night Lords Trilogy...

Received a piece of unfortunate news recently-- that a great producer/AD that I worked with for the past 2 years (time freaking flies..) at the Black Library/Games Workshop is leaving the company and moving on in her career.

Few producers/ADs have left as strong an impression as she has in terms of work ethic and professionalism, and the pieces that I have collaborated with her on, have all become better thanks to her C̶o̶m̶m̶i̶s̶a̶r̶-̶l̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶p̶a̶s̶s̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶I̶n̶q̶u̶i̶s̶i̶t̶o̶r̶ ̶g̶r̶a̶d̶e̶ ̶a̶t̶t̶e̶n̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶d̶e̶t̶a̶i̶l̶ highly practical, keenly translated and kindly-worded input that I am most certain the many freelancers that have worked under her guidance can attest to.

So here's to you, Karen Miksza. Its been a privilege!

Perhaps we'll fight together again some day, on a different battlefield..! \m/

+ + + + + + + +Note to self: Never make unicorn-related remarks in times of personal weakness lest they come back and bite you in the ass.

This chapter are shadowy blue armour wearing descendants of the White Scars, and they are embroiled in fierce urban combat with their nemesis, the Punishers traitor legion.

The brief was conveniently open: to illustrate a fight between a Dark Hunters squad led by a captain against a Punishers detachment. Also, there was to be a Eldar Farseer fighting alongside the Dark Hunters. This gave me all the inspiration/excuse to set up a narrative of an ambush gone awry, playing off the title of course.

This title-play was a cheeky idea that I'm glad Karen went through with; it involves a kind of linear narrative from left to right, or "back cover to front cover". The idea was to portray this detachment of Punishers as having taken a position in the city and successfully springing an ambush, only to be countered by a shock and awe move by the Dark Hunters, thereby bringing light... to the darkness... both literally and metaph... I know... I know... I'm sorry.

So this initial ambush goes off pretty well (as evident from the torn up bridge and ongoing bolter battle and pink-misted Dark Hunter) and having the main "turning point" in the story being a Punisher blind-firing as he takes cover against a pillar- the very spine of the book itself. (In the end, the team decided that marines do not fight with that kind of tactical-cowardice (hoho) and fight with more tactical-glory and so I got him an excuse to be in a reload position while dodging flying debris... legit enough!)

This then made me consider making use of the demonic teeth more and the idea to have him do a Rambo safety pin bite-pull on his grenade was born. I pushed the Punisher warpaint and gave them cheek paint with the impression of more teeth, never quite saw it in any ref and thought it a decent addition to extend the skeletal appearance.

His traitor battle brother handing him a fresh magazine of frangible tipped bolter ammo (nice for urban confines I suppose where you don't want to destroy potential cover with the typical HE rounds...as the guy with the heavy bolter is doing...) with under-maintained armour, coolant leaking from his thruster pack.

Then we have the captain himself, with battle axe and bolt pistol as his brief-determined loadout (which inspired the counter-ambush idea in the first place) bursting through the wall Jin Roh style. Since I know physically there isn't a really good excuse to create in a two-across-marine-sized breach in a wall with a single axe swing I thought suggesting the Farseer maybe helping out psychically would be half-decent reason to suspend disbelief, along with the fact it was an already low-integrity swiss-cheesed wall to begin with. Lastly, since I'm doing quite a number of firsts for myself, I've never drawn a combi-bolter going off at the same time. Final excuse to introduce more light and colour!

As of this piece I feel like I'm now technically at the point of diminishing return on that scale where "how clear is the vision" vs. "how much content is on display" is concerned, and am constantly trying to rethink my approach and strategy towards mark-making and design in general that still honours the client brief. Illustration and design is so cyclic its not even funny.. anyways, that's all from me folks, hope you enjoy it!

It certainly felt like forever since I last illustrated Grimaldus and the mysterious Celestial Lion fighting back to back. Imagine my surprise, when I was asked to revisit that same battlefield a year later..! As of writing this, it has been almost two years since I first painted darkened steel and gold against an afternoon sun.

The brief was seemingly straightforward- to show the same duo, in that same battle, but from a different angle. I supposed it went without saying that it needed enough references or semblance of consistency to the original Armageddon cover. My first idea was to 'homage' the title literally, with lots more gore and ballistic carnage and that's when I recalled that while doing the first Armageddon cover, I had wanted to make it even warmer in palette but chose otherwise at the end in order to let the colours stand by themselves in a more white-light environment and not end up in a cloudy orange-y atmospheric soup; not to mention them looking more colour-balanced against the iconic fade-to-white Space Marines Battles template. So this time, I thought it would be the perfect excuse to revisit that warm palette to not only give a nod to the title, add even more gore and flame, but to the notion of a setting sun that is that amazingly super duper clever metaphor I thought would be neat to have to show just how long they've been at their ordeal and that their time's almost up...herp...derp

Oh yes, some throwback details like a familiar Ork axe blade finally being broken by Grimaldus who is, of course still showing off his blind-firing skill. Almost looks like he's about to pay big time for being too showy with his plasma pistol.

Now that I've received my complementary copy in the mail, along with my long-awaited Armageddon book... its time to finally put a name to that Celestial Lion.

That's all from me for now! Hope I won't have to wait too long for future releases And as always, I hope you enjoy it!

This one was a killer! Pretty happy with how it turned out though My very special thanks to Stepanie Toro for her ideas and guidance on our first time collaboration! (Really happy Zophal has his own page! haha )

This one happens to be about the Flesh Tearers, with the first chapter master Amit carving a bloody genocidal swath across a courtyard with the Librarian Nuriel and Chaplain Zophal alongside him, finishing off what he started. The back cover (left half of image) features a falen Eagle Warrior marine, spent bolter casings raining on him and reflections of tracer fire dancing off his well-maintained armour(shame about all that work!). There was one Flesh Tearer in particular that I like, which is the one carving away with an upside down grip. I imagine he somehow catching glimpses of sanity through his blinding rage disorder and while feeling spent mentally, the combat stimulants boiling through his veins amplifies his physical urges as he saws away at already dismembered remains.

I especially enjoyed designing Zophal's armour, taking some cues from Neil Robert's numerous custom pieces from his body of work -namely the exhaust nozzles on the backpack. I thought they looked more ornamental and chalice-like, which I thought quite fitting for the Chaplain and adds some nice material contrast from the gunmetal armour. The helmet, incuding the blood spray pattern and chest ornamentation, borrows aesthetic sensibility from the Mexican Day of the Dead festival, or at least what I remember of it.

Hope you guys enjoy this one! There's quite a backlog of pieces I've done for GW/BL that have yet to be released, so can't wait to share when I can.

I realise over the years I've gotten increasingly shite at managing my DA 'routine'. Quite frankly I find myself balacing my time with my client work, teaching endeavour(which is turning out to be a really fulfilling new chapter in life) and working on side projects that I actually find it increasingly difficult to sit down and respond to comments here like I used to. Its always been a thing of mine to respond as much as possible and I still aspire to do so when I can, but I guess I'm in a pretty frantic pace of life at the moment. And I hope that my lack of replies do not come off as apathy or worse. I enjoy reading all the comments and critique and am thankful for your time in letting me know how you feel about the work in general. Especially for my work on hardcore IP like 40K... the level of 'fangasm' as I call it never ceases to blow my mind time and again. You guys always light that fire under my ass and I hope in my own way I never let you down.

As such, I hope that its a bit more obvious that when it comes to posting work I've done, I've always put more emphasis into the description section-- elaborating on my thoughts and process to share as much of my personal experience in art as possible for those of you who are more keen to know. To my mind, its the best I can do to make up for not being able to respond personally to your often colourful commentary.

I'm very thankful for all the support over the past decade here on DA(wow has it been that long... u_u), so much wouldn't have happened without it, and I can't wait to share the stuff I've been working on the side in greater detail, soon enough.